There has been developed an infra-red sensing charge-coupled device (IR-CCD) imager which utilizes Schottky-barrier detectors for sensing the infra-red radiation and charge-coupled devices for transferring the detected signal from the detectors. One construction of such an imager is described in the article of W. F. Kosonocky et al., entitled "Design and Performance of 64.times.128 Element PtSi Schottky-barrier Infra-Red Charge-Coupled Device (IRCCD) Focal Plane Array", SPIE, Volume 344, Infrared Sensor Technology (1982), pp. 66-77. One problem with such imagers is to achieve a high-fill factor. "Fill-factor" is a term used to designate the ratio of the active detector area to the total area of the imager. The higher the fill-factor, the greater the sensitivity of the imager since its detector area is greater which permits the detection of a larger amount of infra-red radiation. In order to increase the fill-factor it is desirable to minimize the area of the substrate in which the imager is formed which is taken-up by the non-detecting elements, such as the charge-coupled devices, and to have the detector elements fill up all of the area which is not used by the non-detecting elements. To have the detector elements cover all of the area available for them, it is desirable to have a process which forms the detector elements right up to the edges of the non-detecting elements, i.e., uses the non-detecting elements as the alignment means for the detector elements.